Did Comets Bring Water to Earth? Maybe Not.

December 11, 2014 7:59 PM

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There was no shortage of drama when the European Space Agency’s probe Philae set down on a comet last month—the first such landing in history. First Philae bounced, then it bounced again, ending up with one of its three legs sticking up in the air, and in the shadow of a cliff that prevented its solar panels from recharging its batteries. For two days, the probe hurried to complete whatever science it could….and then everything went black.

But that hardly spelled the end of the mission. Philae’s mother ship, Rosetta, has continued to orbit comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, as it’s been doing since August, taking measurements and images of unprecedented quality. And with nearly a year of close-up observations to go, Rosetta has already ...